1. Field of the Invention
The invention is in the field of analytical chemistry and more specifically in the filed of mass spectrometry.
2. Related Art
A New DART™ ionization source has been developed by Robert B. Cody. See U.S. Pat. No. 6,949,741 to Cody et al and U.S. application publication 2005/0196871 A1, the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference. The above patent a publication teach a metastable/electron source capable of generating either electrons or metastables for atmospheric pressure ionization.
Collisional Induced Dissociation (CID) is a method used to generate product ions in mass spectrometry (MS). CID is used to generate product ion mass spectra of ions that have already be separated on the basis of mass, mass-to-charge value (m/z), collisional cross-section, time-of-flight, frequency, position, or the like. For example, in MS/MS or MSn. CID uses a collision gas to collide with an analyte. The collision imparts energy to the analyte resulting in fragmentation and the production of product ions.